Video – People from all over the Great Lakes basin fear Asian carp will storm the lakes

Chicago is central in the battle against Asian Carp (Credit: Flickr/Jeremy M Farmer)

Chicago may be ground zero for the battle to keep Asian carp from invading the Great Lakes, but people around the sprawling Great Lakes basin are worried about the invasive fish storming the world’s largest source of surface freshwater.

Residents of the eastern Great Lakes region say government agencies aren’t moving quickly enough to keep Asian carp from colonizing the Great Lakes and many of its tributaries.

See what our Great Lakes friends to the east are saying about Asian carp.

The federal government is holding a series of public hearings on a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers study of how best to separate the Great Lakes and Mississippi River watersheds. Artificial connections like the Chicago Waterway System allow Asian carp and dozens of other invasive species to move between these massive watersheds.

The Corps’ study won’t be done until mid-2015 at the earliest. Work on a solution will take even longer.

Residents of New York, Ohio and Ontario have told the Corps that the government must speed up its study to spare the Great Lakes an Asian carp invasion. Now it’s time for people in the western Great Lakes to make their voices heard. The Corps will hold public hearings on its Great Lakes and Mississippi River Interbasin Study (GLMRIS) in Green Bay on Jan. 25 and Traverse City on Jan. 27.